


Kill the Past

by chickenmuffinsoup55555



Series: baby talon dick au [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Dick Grayson is a Talon, Gen, Secret Identity, Sort Of, same age au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:41:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27897721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chickenmuffinsoup55555/pseuds/chickenmuffinsoup55555
Summary: Damian fights a Talon.  Simple enough, except the Talon is a child, and that child is strangely familiar.Talon has a target.  Simple enough, except that target is Robin, and that name rings a bell.
Relationships: Dick Grayson & Damian Wayne
Series: baby talon dick au [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2090475
Comments: 7
Kudos: 164





	Kill the Past

**Author's Note:**

> there is some mild description of injuries of a minor (damian), but I don't think it's graphic?

“Ugh,” Damian grunted as he slammed onto the rooftop. He shoved himself up, and just barely caught the light  _ thud _ of his opponent dropping gracefully in front of him. One hand clutched at the wound in his side, the other groped his boot, looking for the knife he was praying he hadn’t lost. His katana was several rooftops away by now, kicked out of his hands fairly early into the fight. His comm had also been smashed early on, something Damian suspected was intentional. He’d sent out a distress signal, of course, once it became apparent this child would actually be a formidable opponent. Because it was a child; even though Damian couldn’t see its face, it was the same height as him, and its build was slight and lithe with the underdeveloped-ness of youth. Except, it wasn’t  _ only  _ a child. Damian could have handled that. This thing was different. Damian cut it, and it didn’t bleed. He dislocated its shoulder, and it shoved it back into place without a second’s hesitation. And now, staring into the impassive goggles of the cowl that covered the child’s face, Damian’s blood on the sickle-like knives it held, he knew that he couldn’t beat it.

But that wasn’t any reason to stop trying.

Damian lunged forward, refusing to allow the child--the  _ thing _ \--to have the offensive. The child accepted the attack easily, backpedaling and blocking blows with an almost acrobatic lightness of feet. Damian backed it all the way to the edge of the roof before it ducked, leaving Damian off-balance after his blow aimed directly at the creature’s golden goggles. Something solid slammed into Damian from behind, and he felt himself teetering towards the edge. Without conscious thought, his knife fell from his hands, clambering down to the street below and his arms windmilled at his sides in a desperate attempt to find his balance and prevent his body from following his weapon. Then, something yanked on the back of Damian’s collar sending him sprawling back onto the rooftop. Damian rolled, every part of him sore, lightheaded from blood-loss. This time, he could only manage to push himself up to his knees.

He looked up to see his own reflection in that same pair of goggles, far too close to his face. A gloved hand reached out, impervious to Damian’s meager attempts to shove it away. Clawed fingertips dug underneath his mask and pulled it up. After a brief inspection, the child tossed it to the side. Damian spit a mixture of saliva and blood as close to the thing’s face as he could. He missed by several feet.

“Go on and  _ do it _ ,” Damian ground out. He didn’t mean it. Damian didn’t want to die, but he knew how to act when faced with death. He screwed his face into the closest approximation of Todd’s as he could, and prepared to go down kicking and screaming.

The child’s hands twitched forwards, and Damian thought for certain he had only seconds before those golden knives plunged into his flesh—only, they didn’t. They clattered to the ground. The creature reached up, and with one hand, pulled off the black, impersonal cowl to reveal a boy, no older than Damian. 

Damian blinked. Golden eyes blinked back at him. The boy’s head tilted, birdlike, to the side.

“What do you want?” Damian asked, unable to maintain a completely combative tone, so surprised by the turn of events.

“You’re not a Robin,” the boy said, his tone a mixture of confusion and question.

“Of course I’m Robin,” Damian snapped.

“No, you’re not. Talon’s meant to kill Robin, but you’re not Robin.”

Damian bristled at that. He took the mantle of Robin very seriously. He knew the story of the first Robin, the one who’s mantle he’d inherited. The boy from the circus, the only one of his Father’s strays that Damian would accept to be Batman’s son. Richard Grayson had created the title of Robin from dust, built a legacy that would live on after him. He saved Father’s life, losing his own in the process. Todd, Drake, Brown; they were just pretenders. Damian was the true heir, to Batman and to Robin. Only the blood son was worthy to accept the mantle of the son who’d given his blood for Batman.

That said, Damian wasn’t stupid. If the boy was out to kill Robin, it wouldn’t do to convince him that Damian was Robin. Even if he definitely was.

“And what are you then?” Damian asked instead. “You’re certainly not human.”

“I’m Talon. What are you?”

“I’m…” Damian groaned. Partly so he didn’t have to come up with a response, and partly because the stinging in his side was only growing worse, his fingers now saturated in blood. The boy’s—Talon’s—luminescent eyes flickered to Damian’s wound. Slowly, he pulled off a glove, and reached out with his bare hand. His fingertips barely grazed the wound before he whipped his hand back, inspecting the splash of red against tan skin.

“You’re…bleeding,” Talon said, like he was tasting the words on his tongue.

“All thanks to you,” he growled.

Talon focused back on Damian and leaned forward from his crouch so he was kneeling in front of Damian. He squinted, leaning his face closer, like he was searching for something. “You are familiar,” Talon stated, matter-of-fact.

Damian had half a dozen smart-ass responses he could have given to try and deflect the strangeness of that statement that he didn’t give. “Why did you want to kill Robin?” Damian asked instead. He just needed to buy himself some time, he may as well gather information in that time.

“Talon didn’t want to kill Robin. Talon was  _ meant  _ to.” Talon straightened his back and puffed up his chest, and Damian got the distinct impression he was quoting someone when he said, “’Talon must kill Robin. It is Talon’s final transformation. Talon must kill Talon’s past.’” His posture relaxed. “But you’re wrong. You’re not Robin.”

“If  _ I’m  _ not Robin, then who  _ is _ ?”

Talon shrugged, a strangely mechanical motion compared to the gracefulness of all his other movements.

“If I’m not Robin, then what are you still doing here?”

Talon froze. At first, Damian thought it was because of his question, but then Damian heard it too, the familiar pounding of several sets of boots on rooftops. Talon whipped around in the direction of the sound, snatching his knives up as he went. He positioned himself in front of Damian, and if he and Talon hadn’t just spend all night trying to kill each other, he might’ve thought it was a protective stance.

When Damian caught sight of a distinctive black outline against the light-polluted sky, he sagged in relief, forgetting, for a moment, all his training, and calling out, “Father!”

“Robin!” came Batman’s gravelly voice, and before Damian knew it he was swept up in his father’s arms. “What happened?”

“Uh, Batman?” Todd’s modified voice said, startling Damian, who hadn’t registered anybody else on the rooftop besides he father. Now that he looked, Red Hood and Spoiler were there too, along with Talon, staring warily at the new arrivals with his knives hanging limp at his sides. “Bruce?” Todd said again, this time with something that sounded like a crack in his voice. “You’re gonna wanna see this.”

Damian felt his father’s arms go slack around him, and Damian had to cling to his shoulders to keep from falling. Father corrected his mistake, now clinging to Damian just as tightly. 

“Impossible,” his father breathed, and if Damian weren’t in his arms he might not have heard him say it. Then, louder, but only by barely, “He looks just like-“

“Dick,” Todd said, dropping to his knees in front of Talon. Spoiler stood at the ready behind him. To Damian’s utter surprise, Todd ripped off his helmet, tossing it to the side. “How are you…”

Talon took a couple cautious steps towards Todd. With his ungloved hand, he pulled off Todd’s mask in the same manner he’d pulled of Damian’s, except this time looked perhaps more gentle, almost, caring? He left a swatch mark of blood on Todd’s cheek. Talon stared at Todd with eerie, unswerving eyes.

“You’re meant to be shorter,” he said abruptly. Jason’s laugh was sudden and hysterical as he grabbed Talon and pulled him into his arms. Damian’s mind swam in confusion as the world went black around him, even as he tried to focus on Jason’s desperate embrace of Damian’s would-be killer.

When the world came back into color, Damian was lying in the medical bed down in the cave, staring up at the bat-covered ceiling. He pushed himself into a sitting position, biting back a moan at the aches in his body. A flicker of movement in his peripheral vision made him jerk his head to the side. Perched haphazardly on a nearby chair, eyes gleaming in the low-light, was Talon.

“I’m sorry I hurt you,” Talon said, voice chipper. He held out an arm, stick-straight. “I’m Dick Grayson, nice to meet you.”

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> also posted on my tumblr
> 
> I still don't know how to link it but my username is chickenmuffinsoup


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